


Fred Rosen and the Uncles

by orphan_account



Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: Community: inception_kink, F/M, Gen, POV First Person, POV Original Character, character cameos, ten years in the future
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-11-11
Updated: 2010-11-11
Packaged: 2017-10-15 22:29:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,713
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/165492
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For the kink meme prompt: Phillipa's 1st boyfriend has to go through the test of meeting her father, her little brother and of course Uncle Arthur, Uncle Eames, Uncle Yusuf and Uncle Saito.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fred Rosen and the Uncles

**I.**  
Of course I’d heard the rumor that her father was in the Mafia. Everyone in the damn school took it for granted that if you crossed Phillipa Cobb, her father would have you whacked. I just hadn’t taken it seriously, because I’d lived down the street from them for ten years and seeing old Mr. Cobb puttering around the yard on the weekends had taken the fear out of me.

Now that he’s sitting across from me, all squinty-eyed and suspicious, I wish I’d paid more attention to those rumors. Hell, I wish I’d made it all the way through _The Godfather_ at least.

“What are your intentions toward my daughter, Frederick?” he asks me.

I almost shit my pants. Intentions? “Um. We were going to go get some food and then see that new _Spiderman_ movie,” I mumble. Where is Phillipa? I need her to come riding in any minute now, like a knight saving the damsel in distress, because I figure I have another three minutes before I give in to the babbling terror that’s building.

Out of the corner of my eye, I can see that little shit, Jimmy, peeking down the hall at me. He always was a nasty twerp, pulling girls’ hair and telling tales. If Phillipa weren’t so hot, the fact that she was related to him would have turned me off right away.

Damnit, where is she?

Her father hasn’t said anything. He’s just stroking his chin and looking at me like he can measure the very depths of my soul. Fuck yeah I believe this guy was in the Mafia. I’m only fifteen, that’s far too young to die, right? Is there a Mafia rule about not killing teenage boys?

Just when I swear to Jesus that I will never jerk off in the shower again, if he’ll please, _please_ let me get out of this alive, Phillipa comes swanning down the stairs, giving Jimmy a kick in the ribs on her way past.

“Da-a-ad,” she says, rolling her eyes. “Are you embarrassing me in front of Fred?”

Mr. Cobb smiles at her, fondly. “Don’t stay out too late, Phil.” For a minute I think I’m safe, but when his attention swings back to me it’s that vicious, penetrating stare again.

I should be afraid, but Phillipa’s turned to me and the way her face lights up makes me forget the mortal danger I’m probably in. “Don’t worry,” she whispers as she guides me out of the house, “he’s really a big teddy bear underneath.”

Ah, Phillipa. My knight in shining armor.

 **II.**

The first uncle criticizes my taste in food.

“Phillipa, dear,” he says, striding up to our table and sitting down next to her like we’ve been expecting him and not like he’s some crazy British stranger interrupting the first half of our very first date, “I think you should know, any boy who thinks Burger King is an acceptable date is probably not a keeper.”

“Uncle Eames!” she says brightly, reaching over to wrap him in a hug. “I didn’t know you were in town! What’re you doing here?”

“Oh, I was in the neighborhood, visiting your father, and I felt a craving for a Whopper,” he says, but he’s looking at me all hard-eyed when he says it and I know Mr. Cobb has sent him.

He stays at the table for the entire meal. He and Phillipa chat excitedly about all sorts of things (apparently, he’s teaching her how to count cards) while I push my fries around my tray and wonder why the first date of my life involves both the girl of my dreams and a seedy, poorly dressed gambler.

“So, Frederick,” he says to me, “why Burger King?”

I’m about to try to defend the inherent yumminess of the Chicken Tenders when Phillipa rides to my defense.

“He’s in high school, Uncle Eames!” she exclaims with a laugh. “He’ll be able to take me out to all the fancy four-star restaurants once he graduates.” Then her eyes go sly. “Surely you know what it’s like to be broke.”

Uncle Eames just scowls at me, and pushes me out of the way when he eventually leaves.

 

 **III.**

Her aunt sits behind us in the movie theater. At first I like her, because the first thing she does is give me my wallet back.

“Here,” she says, dropping it in my lap, along with some popcorn. “I told Eames it wasn’t nice to pickpocket teenagers.”

And it isn’t nice to pickpocket teenagers, especially not when they’re out on dates with gorgeous blonde goddesses and suddenly find themselves unable to afford movie tickets. Luckily Phillipa had been cool and just laughed a little. “You paid for dinner,” she’d said, reaching into her purse for her own wallet.

The money’s all there, and so are my debit card and my school ID, which makes it worse. If someone steals your wallet and then doesn’t take the money, what does that mean? Is there some form of hit out on me now?

So, I’m pretty sure Auntie Ariadne is on my side, or at least I am up until the movie starts and she leans forward and hisses, “I know what you’re up to,” right against my ear.

Right now, I don’t know what I’m up to, besides trying not to piss my pants. I’d run to the bathroom, but there’s probably an Uncle waiting for me in there.

“What am I up to?” I whisper awkwardly, out of the side of my mouth. I hope Phillipa doesn’t hear me, but maybe if Ariadne tells me what I’m up to I can be up to something else.

“What all teenage boys are up to,” she hisses back.

Oh.

That.

Well, I hadn’t exactly planned on it for tonight. That’s not to say that sometime, in the future, when we’re far, far away from Phillipa’s crazy extended family I wouldn’t want to, because she is crazy hot, but at this particular moment—

Phillipa lays her head down on my shoulder, and I forget to be afraid.

 **IV.**

I can tell the next Uncle because of his suit. No one who dresses that sharp is legit.

Well, the suit and the fact that Phil and I are parked up in Meadowspring Park and my seat is all the way back and she’s lying on top of me, kissing me, and then there’s a loud bang on the window and a skinny, angry man in a suit is staring down at us. I’m pretty sure I can see the outline of a gun under his jacket.

Phil, who I’ve come to love dearly over these past months, does not get off of me as she reaches over to roll the window down. Sometimes I love her brazen fearlessness and then there are times like these when I wonder if she’s trying to get me killed.

“Go away, Uncle Arthur,” she shouts through the crack in the window. “You have no room to complain about people kissing other people.”

Uncle Arthur raises an eyebrow at us, but thankfully doesn’t pull out his gun and shoot me in the face. I can tell he’s still considering it, though. My brother never mentioned dealing with any of this shit when he went out with Katie Costanza.

I really don’t want to have to battle all of her Uncles (plus her father and her Auntie Ariadne), however many of them there may be. I’m not Scott Pilgrim.

Her Uncle Arthur just stares at us for a bit, and while Phillipa seems game to keep making out in front of him, I lose my nerve when I catch sight of him out of the corner of my eye. Phil rolls her eyes at me and pushes herself up and back into the passenger seat.

We end the night in silence as I drive her home, the two of us sitting as far apart as the narrow confines of the car will allow. Her father is sitting on the front porch when I pull into the driveway, so I don’t even attempt a good night kiss.

After tonight, I’m not sure if she wants one. After tonight, I’m not sure I do either.

 **V.**

The next time I see Phil, we don’t say much of anything at all. The time after that, I pick a fight.

It starts with me not caring about how mean Mr. Edelson is to her, and then criticizing her choice of friends and then, “I don’t think I can do this anymore, Phil,” I tell her, finally. “You might be used to crazy people showing up and threatening you and having guns, but I’m not. I really – I’m sorry Phil, but I can’t take this anymore.”

For the first time since I’ve known her, Phil lowers her shield. She’s not my brave knight any longer; she looks like a fifteen year old girl who’s about to start crying in the middle of the school hallway. “You’re leaving me?” she mouths, but since I can’t hear the words come out, I try to ignore them.

Dozens of our classmates swarm around us on their way to class. Some notice Phillipa Cobb in tears, and some don’t, but I’ve already turned and walked off toward the chemistry labs.

 **VI.**

When I meet her next Uncle I realize what I’ve known all along: these people can’t possibly be related to her.

He’s standing by the bleachers as I walk home, looking awkward and carrying a silver briefcase. Drug dealer, I peg him. It’s not just the briefcase and the dark skin and the fact that he’s loitering around an empty high school football field. No, it’s probably also got to do with the fact that as soon as I come within his reach, he stabs me in the neck with a syringe.

“Sorry, Fred,” I hear him tell me as he pulls me under the bleachers. “But I think we need to talk.”

When I wake up, we’re sitting in Phil’s living room, but Phil and her family aren’t around. It’s just me and this new uncle, Uncle Yusuf.

I pointedly ignore him, because until now the Uncles had never actually done anything to me. Oh, sure, they’ve threatened and they’ve insulted and they’ve picked my pocket, but kidnapping is something new.

I like the Cobbs’s living room, though. It’s warm and roomy and filled with pictures of the family. There’s Mr. Cobb beaming down at a newborn James, and there’s a seven-year-old Phil riding a pony. A much younger Uncle Arthur is blowing out candles on a birthday cake and Auntie Ariadne is graduating. Everywhere, everyone is grinning broadly.

Except in the ones near the fireplace. There’s an older couple, holding two children: Phil and Jimmy and their grandparents? They all look miserable. Next to it is a picture of Mr. Cobb and a pretty dark-haired woman. Mrs. Cobb? She’s only in this one photo.

I stare at it for a while until Uncle Yusuf comes up behind me. “You see, Fred,” he says softly, “people have left her before. Do you really want to feel this hurt again?”

That photo, with her sitting on her grandmother’s lap. She looks like she’s crying, but the way her face is angled, it looks like she’s staring at the picture of her parents.

“I don’t want to hurt her,” I tell him, “but you guys scare me. I want her, but not her family.”

Surprisingly, he doesn’t seem the least bit offended. “Sometimes we must take the good with the bad,” he says. Is he admitting that he and the rest of the Uncles are bad? Am I going to get shot this time?

“I’m not brave like she is,” I whisper. He just looks at me for a moment, with his sad puppy dog eyes. Drug dealers shouldn’t have sad eyes like that.

“I’ll talk to Dom,” he promises me.

When I wake up, I’m lying on the grass under the football bleachers. No one is around me.

A soft buzz and then hiss tells me that the sprinklers are about to go off. With a yelp, I pull myself to my feet and start running home.

By the time I get there, it’s getting dark and I’m sopping wet, but I can’t bring myself to turn up the walk to my front door. Instead, I keep going. Five houses down, the Cobb house is waiting for me, the front door open.

 **VII.**

Things have gotten better. I’m still terrified of her father, of course, because that’s right and normal, but no Uncles have descended in over a year. I’m beginning to think that I’m home clear.

I really should have been expecting the last Uncle. It’s prom night, after all, and while her father paid for our limo, Phil paid for our hotel room.

“Your father’s going to kill me,” I murmur as she climbs on top of me in the limo. “Kill me dead.”

She laughs. “I keep telling you Fred, he’s just a big softie underneath it all!”

Half of me is almost willing to believe it, which is why I’m able to tip the limo driver and climb out, into the Stony Sea Inn’s parking lot. I’m half expecting an Uncle to jump out of one of the cars and ask me just what I think I’m up to, going into a hotel with Phil on prom night. There’s no good answer to that at all, so I’m glad there’s no one to ask.

Inside, a handsome old Japanese man in an immaculate suit is waiting for us by the front desk. Phil sees him and her eyes widen.

“Uncle Saito-san. I was half-afraid it was going to be Arthur, dragging me out of the limo and back to dad,” she says.

Saito-san just smiles benevolently. “It would have been, but I convinced your father to let me handle things.”

Well, crap. I guess Phil was wrong about the big-softie-underneath-it-all. Now I’m preparing to get my fingers chopped off, because this guy is obviously Yakuza, and that’s what the Yakuza in _Dragon Fire: The Yakuza Rise Again_ did to Don Castiglione in that one scene. Maybe I can convince him to go for a toe instead. Do people need their little toes? Mine are all small and kinda fit in the crooks of the toes next to them. It would look less odd to be missing one of them than to be missing a finger.

“Did you buy the hotel?” Phil jokes, like it’s an old joke between them and I’m about to relax, hoping that this is finally the Uncle that’s on my side, when Saito-san nods.

“I did,” he says.

“What.” I manage before I have to sit down on the ground, hard. The Mafia is one thing, but normal people do not go around buying hotels just to stop their friends’ daughter from having sex.

“I know your father and his friends,” Saito says to Phil. “They love you very much, but sometimes they forget the important things.”

“Ugh,” I mumble, and Saito turns to me.

“No one can be protected forever,” he says to me as he helps me back to my feet. “It would be a terrible thing to grow old and find that your life has been empty.” We’re walking through the corridors now, although I barely remember moving, and he’s saying something about having no regrets and that without risks, life is meaningless.

I’m still not sure if I’m going to get shot or not, but his arm at my elbow is pretty much the only thing that keeps me from bolting when he stops in front of a door.

“I have decided,” he says as he opens it and ushers us into the honeymoon suite, “to take a leap of faith with you, Mr. Rosen.”

Phillipa oohs and ahhs over the dozens of candles and roses strewn everywhere, and does a little twirl in the middle of the room before sinking down onto the bed. Saito and I are still standing in the doorway.

“That doesn’t mean we won’t kill you if you hurt her,” he adds, then gives me a gentle shove into the room.


End file.
